The Long Walk Back
by sincerelymendacious
Summary: Milla accompanies Ford back to his office after an incident in the lobby.


The scene that greeted her when she floated out into the lobby was almost too ridiculous to be real, and for a second Milla wondered if it was merely an elaborate hallucination that her brain had concocted.

But no, it was really happening, unless the other people who were staring at the spectacle were also hallucinating the same thing that she was. It had happened before. Shared illusions among psychics weren't rare, but somehow she doubted that even the most imaginative person in this room would have ever thought something like this up.

There were two men standing smack dab in the middle of the lobby, a puddle of spilled brown liquid just to their left. These men were Ford Cruller, the former Grand Head of the Psychonauts, and Truman Zanotto, the recently-elected Grand Head. They were fighting over a mop.

"Give it!" Ford shouted, both of his hands clenched around the mop's wooden handle. "What'd I tell you about touchin' my mops?" He pulled with all his might, trying to snatch it from Truman, but to no avail. Although Truman only had one hand on the mop (placed in the space between Ford's) he seemed to be having little trouble preventing Ford from getting it.

The fact that he was besting an old man still recovering from a traumatic brain injury at a bizarre game of tug-of-war clearly brought Truman no joy. Concern was etched onto his features, and Milla had no doubt that resolving this situation before it escalated further was his top priority right now. "Agent Cruller," he began tentatively, "the-"

"Who's Agent Cruller?" Ford interrupted sharply. "I'm the janitor, you dolt!" He gritted his teeth and tugged again. The mop barely budged. "I've been cleanin' these floors since before you were born!"

The actual janitor was standing off to the side awkwardly, but explaining that to Ford would have been an exercise in futility. "Right, uh, my mistake," Truman said apologetically. "It's just that it's such a small spill," he continued, having decided to go along with Ford's current delusion. "It isn't really something that you should trouble yourself with."

Around them, a crowd had formed. It was a little after eight in the morning, and many agents were either just coming in or heading home. The mood among these many spectators varied. Some found the whole thing funny- these were the newer agents, the ones who had only known Ford as a crazy old man and not as the greatest Grand Head the Psychonauts had ever known. Others regarded the scene with a near vindictive glee, likely they were people who hadn't voted for Truman and were more than happy to see him in such an undignified position. Some people simply stared in confusion, uncertain of what was going on and even less certain of what to do about it.

Within these groups were a small minority of agents who had been close to Ford, and whose relationship with him had ran deeper than the typical one between an employer and employee. From her spot near the reception desk Milla could see Agent Anna Seo across the room, frowning even as those next to her laughed and sneered derisively. Their eyes met for a brief moment. Then Anna shrugged and turned, pushing past her fellow agents as she headed for the exit.

Milla was tempted to do the same. It was difficult for her to see the man who had changed her life like this, unable to remember who he was and fighting tooth and nail for the chance to clean up a coffee spill. And she was tired too, having just worked thirty-six hours straight on an incredibly tedious case. Her feet hurt, her purse strap kept slipping off of her shoulder, and strands of hair kept coming loose from her hastily-done ponytail. Slipping into the crowd and going out the door was certainly an inviting idea.

She smothered the desire to leave, feeling guilty that such thoughts had even occurred to her given the circumstances. Instead she drew closer, gracefully weaving her way to the middle of the room. Things had unfortunately escalated, despite Truman's best efforts. If anything, Ford seemed even more determined than ever to wrest the mop from Truman's grasp, and that, combined with his outrage that someone would dare to try to stop him from doing his job, appeared to have increased his strength. Truman was now holding onto the mop with both hands and he was having a much more difficult time keeping a hold on the mop than he had at the beginning of the fight.

"I just think," Truman said, moving back a little as Ford's slipper clad foot came dangerously close to stepping on his toes, "that maybe you should let someone else handle this one." He gave a placating smile. "You've been doing so much around here that everyone else is starting to get bored." There was some truth to those words. It had been a long time since any of the janitors had had to clean the lobby. Ford's janitor persona always manifested whenever he happened to wander into this section of headquarters. None of them really cared if Ford did their jobs for them, and Pulaski probably would have been more than happy to allow Ford to clean up that spill had Truman not intervened.

"You ain't ready!" Ford said, his face red with exertion. "You ain't got the experience!"

The smile slid off of Truman's face. "What?" His hands slackened in his confusion as he tried to figure out what it exactly it was that Ford thought he wasn't ready for. "I'm not -"

Whatever he was about to say was cut off by Ford's foot making swift contact with his shin. Truman grunted, more in surprise than pain, his grip further loosened, and a half-second later the mop was out of his grasp. "You haven't refined your technique!" Ford yelled, clutching the mop close to him. "You go side to side when you should be doing figure eights!"

Truman stared at him, his confusion boiling over into anger. "My technique is plenty refined," he shot back, his patience completely evaporated. He swiped forward, attempting to grab the mop again, but Ford dodged backwards, and turned to the side, effectively putting the mop out of Truman's physical reach.

Unfortunately, that tactic would not keep the mop in Ford's hands if Truman decided to use telekinesis to take it away from him, an action that Ford, in his current state, had no protection against. And Truman, having given up on talking to Ford, was on the verge of doing it too, even if he'd probably regret it once his anger had ebbed away.

It was time for her to step in. In an instant Milla was at Ford's side, her hand gently touching his shoulder. He jumped at her touch, regarding her suspiciously, certain that she too would try to take his mop for reasons he couldn't understand. She smiled, and he relaxed a little. Some part of him must have recognized that she was someone he could trust, even if he couldn't remember the exact nature of their relationship.

"Mr. Cruller," she began gently, "everybody here appreciates all of the hard work you put in to keeping this place clean." She wasn't even going to try to debate him on his identity; it would only lead to another argument. "Headquarters wouldn't be the place it is without you." This was true, but not for the reasons that Ford was currently thinking.

He nodded, his stooped posture straightening a little, glad to hear that somebody appreciated him. Satisfied, he pulled away, wanting to get started on mopping up that coffee spill. "However," she continued before he could get too far. "I think you should let Pulaski take care of this." He balked, but she held a hand up, a request for him to allow her to explain. "I know that you think he isn't ready," she said, "but the only way that Pulaski can gain meaningful experience is if you allow him to go out into the field and learn from his mistakes."

Ford's clouded, uneven eyes grew wide. The words had hit something within him, just as Milla hoped that they would. That had been Grand Head Ford Cruller's own philosophy, and he'd considered it the most important part of an agent's education. He looked at who he thought was Pulaski (who was now rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly, probably embarrassed that he'd gotten as worked up as he had) and then at his mop, sighing. Reluctantly, he handed the mop over to Truman. Truman accepted the mop with an awkward 'thanks', clearly relieved that the incident was finally coming to a close.

"Remember. Figure eights," Ford reminded gruffly before allowing Milla to guide him out of the lobby.

* * *

The walk back to the first floor office that Ford had been reassigned to months ago should have taken about five minutes at most. He and Milla were only about half-way there when that amount of time elapsed. Ford's shuffling gait wasn't fast, his feet dragging on the carpet as he walked, and Milla had slowed her pace down in order to match his. He'd also stop now and then to inspect some potential problem, and would only move on once he was satisfied that things were in order. Though she was weary, Milla wasn't particularly bothered. It had been a while since she had spent any length of time with Ford (a fact that she was more than a little ashamed of) and accompanying him back to his office was the best way to ensure that he got there without any mishaps.

There had been a time, many years ago, when their roles had been reversed, and he had been the one accommodating her. He'd been so kind and patient with her during her first tour of headquarters' treatment facilities, answering all of her nervous questions clearly and without condescending to her. She'd been near tears by the end of it- it had been the first time in such a long time that she'd been treated like a human being.

His manner of speaking hadn't changed all that much, she thought as they made their way towards the corridor his office was located on. He spoke about various janitorial concerns with the same confident expertise that he had had when organizing field missions and gathering important intel.

"You have to use dish washing-detergent," he explained as they rounded a corner and entered a long, brightly lit hallway. "Cleans out stains better than laundry detergent does, and it's much cheaper than buying carpet cleaner."

"I didn't know that," Milla said. She really hadn't, and this information was worth filing away for later. "I'll have to tell Sasha."

"Eh?" Ford stopped and looked at her with a baffled expression on his face. "Tell Sasha what?"

"About the…dish washing detergent," Milla replied, her shoulders slumping. She had been so wrapped up in their conversation that she'd momentarily forgotten that Janitor Cruller only existed for as long as he was in a certain area. He had now walked out of it.

"Huh? What about detergent?" His neck craned upwards, and before she could answer he sped off down the hall, moving faster than Milla had thought him capable of.

He stopped about three-quarters of the way down the hall, in front of the door that neighbored his office to the left. He was still looking up at the florescent light above when she caught up with him. "Hmm," he said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. He pointed at the light. "I give that one three days before I have to change it."

Milla looked up, considering the light above her. "How can you tell?" she asked as her gaze drifted towards the other lights. They all looked the same to her.

Ford tapped her on shoulder, directing her back to the original light. "Watch," he instructed, and she did so, squinting at the brightness. After a few seconds, the light flickered. It was barely perceivable, and she probably would not have seen it if she hadn't been standing right underneath of it. It certainly would have gone unnoticed by anybody walking down the hall.

"It's amazing that you caught that," she said, impressed. Ford's senses were still as keen as ever, even if his mind was still badly broken.

Ford scoffed, waving away her praise. "Been a handyman for near four decades, Agent Vodello," he said, pride in his voice. "It'd be impossible for me not to catch something like that."

Those words, spoken so casually, felt like a punch to the gut, and she struggled to keep the smile on her face. He'd been with the Psychonauts for that long, that was true, but as a top agent and later the Grand Head, not as a maintenance man, or a janitor, or a cafeteria worker, or a groundskeeper. _If we were back in the lobby,_ she wondered as he ranted about how the quality of the lights had gone down over the years, _would you have claimed to have mopped the floors for that long?_

"Be a waste to change it now," Ford said, bringing her out of her unhappy thoughts. "Still got some juice left in her." He glanced down at himself, raising his eyebrows, only now just realizing what he was wearing- a pair of comfortable flannel pajamas under a matching red robe, the belt undone. "Huh. Ain't even in my uniform." He scratched his head marveling over that fact before shrugging his shoulders and proceeding onwards to his office. "Guess I was about to take a nap." Milla followed close behind.

The office was only a few steps away, near the end of the hall. As a security precaution, the door had been outfitted with a special psy-lock that only opened when it picked up on Ford's psychic signature. It resembled the key-card sliders attached to most of the labs and offices, except that it lacked the slot that one would typically slide an ID-card through. It buzzed as Ford drew near, the light on it turning green, and then the steel door slid open.

The interior of the room looked more like a storage closet than any sort of office. Wrenches, hammers, screwdrivers were scattered around the room in what could only be described as an organized chaos. An open ratchet set lay on the old, scratched desk in the center of the room. A long, white futon was adjacent to the desk. Ford had proper living quarters that were more suitable to actual living than this cramped office, but for whatever reason he preferred to sleep in here, and nobody had the heart or the energy to stop him.

"Well alright then, Agent Vodello," Ford said as he moved to enter the office. "Always a pleasure."

"Don't work too hard, darling," Milla replied, doing a decent job of sounding more light-hearted than she felt. She lingered there, eyes on Ford's back, not wanting to leave until the door shut behind him.

She grew concerned when Ford remained in the doorway of his office, standing perfectly still as the seconds passed. Had he fallen asleep while standing up? Chef Cruller had done that once, snoring over a grill with six burgers being cooked over it and waking the instant they were done. She couldn't just leave with him there like that. What if the door closed on him? She reached out to touch his shoulder, the same way that she had done back in the lobby. "Are you alright, Mr. Cruller?"

His head rose drowsily when she made contact. He took a deep, shuddering breath, sounding similar to a person trying to fill their lungs with air after having been underwater for a dangerous amount of time. Slowly, he turned his head towards her, looking at her from over his shoulder.

She gasped, shocked into silence. His eyes were wide, full of fear and desperate, but they were clear in a way that they hadn't been in nearly a year. Her mouth dropped open, and the voice that she managed to find was barely louder than a whisper. "Ford…"

"Milla…" he croaked, his voice weaker than her own. A lightning bolt of what could have been either pain or hope shot through her when he said her name- the last time he had called her by her first name had been before that catastrophic duel with Botulo Kanker; it had been 'Miss' or 'Agent Vodello' since then.

She needed to get Sasha. She needed to take her psy-portal out and do anything she could to keep the mental fog from obscuring her mentor and dear friend again. She needed to grasp him by the shoulders and plead with him to just hang on, just stay with her for a little longer, please, just stay strong, give her some time…

She couldn't do any of those things, because the moment was over before it began. Ford's eyes snapped shut as he put a hand on his forehead, hissing as though he were in a great amount of pain. When he opened them again, they were bleary and dim, the wrinkles under them appearing deeper than they had before.

They stared at one another, him wearily confused and her completely numb. Then Mr. Cruller, the handyman, was back. "Tools are rustin," he said to himself, as though Milla were not there. "Lemon jucie'll sort them right out." And with that comment serving as a farewell, he walked into his office, the door sliding shut behind him.

It took a few seconds for the numbness to wear off, and for her heart to start beating again. When it did, a wave of regret crashed through her. There had been so many things that she could have done in the split-second that the real Ford Cruller had surfaced, and yet she'd been too paralyzed to do any of them. It must have taken every bit of mental power that Ford had just to have that second- what if he couldn't manage to do it again? _If Sasha had been here,_ Milla thought _, he would have known what to do._

She sighed and shook her head. If Sasha had actually been here he would have told her that berating herself wouldn't help Ford and he would have been right. What she needed to do was tell Sasha what had happened so that they could both start formulating a plan to help Ford. Standing here and letting her guilt get the better of her would only waste time. She began heading down the hallway, her heels heavy on the carpet. Levitating would have been faster and easier on her tired feet, but there was a lead ball in her mind that was weighing her down. She tucked a stray strand of hair back behind her hair as she passed under a light flickering over head.


End file.
